Taking a look back to the future

Sep 24 2009 by Stewart Watkins, The Journal

BACK in the days when a microchip was something you ate and a mobile phone was a phone with a long wire, there was a TV programme that promised a weird and wonderful future in which technology would solve most problems.

Admittedly some of the inventions which appeared on the BBC’s Tomorrow’s World programme – the fishing rod that lit up and the washing line that sang when wet, made it little further into our lives than the BBC studio.

But a great many of today’s most common gadgets – mobile phone, digital camera – appeared on the programme.

News that the BBC is to release archives of the programmes online will undoubtedly be greeted with no small degree of nostalgia but it also serves to impress upon us the enormity of the technological strides taken in recent years.

And if anything, the pace of these changes has become even faster.

Much like the innovations on Tomorrow’s World, a lot of the work taking place at NETPark may still seem the stuff of science fiction. I clearly remember seeing the first CDs demonstrated on Tomorrow’s World and couldn’t have believed they’d end up having such an impact. But while the idea of printing electronic circuits onto sheets of flexible plastic – as is done at PETEC – may seem rather far-fetched today, we could soon all be hanging electronic wallpaper that lights up the room or staring at electronic adverts in our newspapers and magazines.

The recent conviction of the liquid bomb plotters served as a classic example of the potential use of NETPark-developed technology.

Kromek’s screening technology will enable passengers to carry safe liquids through airport security by putting them through a scanner capable of identifying the liquid without the need to open the bottle.

And the fingerprint forensic technology developed by ROAR Particles would enable us to tell whether someone has been handling any drugs or chemicals, and even what they had for breakfast.

It offers a wealth of potential applications ranging from health, safety and security, to sports drugs tests.

While I’m sure those of us who log on to the Tomorrow’s World programmes of yesteryear will now wonder why concepts like fax machines and CDs seemed so cutting-edge and far-fetched, we should remember the technological advances taking place today on our own doorstep that look set to revolutionise our lives in the future.

Stewart Watkins is managing director of the County Durham Development Company.